5 Dangers To Global Crops That Could Dramatically Reduce The World Food Supply

By Michael Snyder, on October 29th, 2010

The world food situation is starting to get very, very tight. Unprecedented heat and wildfires this summer in Russia and horrific flooding in Pakistan and China have been some of the primary reasons for the rapidly rising food prices we are now seeing around the globe. In places such as Australia and the African nation of Guinea-Bissau, the big problem for crops has been locusts. In a world that already does not grow enough food for everyone (thanks to the greed of the elite), any disruption in food production can cause a major, major problem. Tonight, thousands of people around the world will starve to death. So what happens if things get even worse? Many agricultural scientists are now warning that global food production is facing dangers that are absolutely unprecedented. Crop diseases such as UG99 wheat rust and the “unintended effects” of genetic modification pose challenges that previous generations simply did not have to face. The outbreak of a real, live global famine looks increasingly possible with each passing year. So are you and your family prepared if a global famine does strike?

Already, there are huge warning signs on the horizon. Just check out what agricultural commodities have been doing. They have been absolutely soaring.

You better get ready – these raw material prices will filter down to U.S. consumers eventually.

So what is going to happen if the world food situation gets even tighter?

Don’t think that it can’t happen.

The following are 5 potential dangers to global crops that could dramatically reduce the world food supply….

UG99 Wheat Rust

UG99 is commonly known as “wheat rust” or “stem rust” because it produces reddish-brown flakes on wheat stalks. The International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center in Mexico believes that approximately 19 percent of the global wheat crop is in imminent danger of being infected with UG99.

Ultimately, it is estimated that about 80 percent of the wheat on the globe is capable of catching the disease.

There is no known cure.

This current strain of wheat rust was discovered in Uganda in 1999 and has spread into areas of Kenya, Sudan, Ethiopia, Yemen and Iran. It is feared that this crippling disease will spread even farther into south Asia, devastating the fertile growing regions of Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and Bangladesh.

“You can talk about crying wolf,” says Ronnie Coffman, director of the Durable Rust Resistance in Wheat project at the University of Cornell in the US, “but it is a wolf”, he asserts, driving across the corn fields of Kansas.

Later on in the same article, Coffman warns that this disease could cause a devastating famine in which literally millions of people would die….

“It can be absolutely devastating if environmental conditions are right,“ he says. “You can count the number of people who could die from this in the millions.”

Mad Soy Disease

Mad Soy disease is spreading at an alarming rate among soy farms down in Brazil. Previously the disease had been confined to the north part of the country, but now it has been increasingly spreading south. This disease retards the maturation of infected plants, and it has been causing yield losses of up to 40 percent. The USDA says that “there are no known effective treatments.”

Verticillium Wilt

Verticillium Wilt is a fungus that prevents lettuce from absorbing water, causing it to quickly grow yellow and eventually wilt. This dangerous fungus is very hard to get rid of totally because it can stay in the soil for up to seven years.

In 2009, a disease known as “late blight” attacked potato and tomato plants in the United States with a ferocity never seen before. According to a press release from Cornell University, late blight had “never occurred this early and this widespread in the U.S.” when it started showing up all over the place early last year.

Late blight begins as ugly brown spots on the stems of potato and tomato plants, and as the spots increase in size, white fungal growth develops until finally a soft rot completely collapses the stem.

This was the disease that was responsible for the Irish potato famine in the 1850s. A major new outbreak could occur without warning.

Genetic Modification

While it may or may not technically be a disease (depending on how you look at it), genetic modification is having a very serious affect on crops around the globe.

For example, about 10 years ago Chinese farmers began to widely adopt Monsanto’s genetically modified Bt cotton. Well, researchers have found that since that time, mirid bugs that are resistant to the Bt pesticide have experienced a complete and total population boom.

Today, six provinces in Northern China are experiencing what can only be described as a “mirid bug plague”. Mirid bugs eat more than 200 different kinds of fruit, vegetables and grains. Chinese farmers in the region are completely frustrated.

In the United States, a different problem is developing. The complete and total reliance of so many U.S. farmers on Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide has resulted in several varieties of glyphosate-resistant “superweeds” developing in many areas of the United States.

The most feared of these “superweeds”, Pigweed, can grow to be seven feet tall and it can literally wreck a combine. Pigweed has been known to produce up to 10,000 seeds at a time, it is resistant to drought, and it has very diverse genetics.

In some areas, superweeds have become so bad that literally tens of thousands of acres of U.S. farmland have actually been abandoned.

But that is what we get for trying to “play God”.

We think that we can just do whatever we want with nature and there will not be any consequences.

One of the most frightening things about genetic modification is that it actually reduces that amount of crop diversity in the world.

For example, if nearly all farmers start using the same “brand” of genetically modified plants that are all virtually identical, it sets up a situation where crop diseases and crop failures can cascade across the planet very easily.

Genetic variety is a very desirable thing, but today our scientists are just doing pretty much whatever they want without really considering the consequences.

It has been said many times that genetic engineering is similar to “performing heart surgery with a shovel”.

The truth is that we just do not know enough about how our ecosystems work to be messing around with them so dramatically.

Perhaps even more frightening is that once these genetically engineered monstrosities have been released into our environment, it is absolutely impossible to recall them. They essentially become a permanent part of our ecosystem.

But can we afford to make any serious mistakes at this point?

The truth is that we already live in a world that is not able to feed itself.

Tonight, approximately 1 billion people across the globe will go to bed hungry. Every 3.6 seconds someone in the world starves to death, and three-fourths of those who starve to death are children under the age of five.

It is currently being projected that global demand for food will more than double over the next 50 years.

So what is going to happen if we start seeing widespread crop failures in the coming years?

The global food supply is not nearly as stable as most people believe. At some point, it is going to be tested severely.

I think everyone needs to be concerned with the enormous amount of contamination from aluminum in the soil and water from geo-engineering (aka chemtrails) This will eventually kill every living thing on the planet. Check out the new documentary “What In The World Are They Spraying”

Lennie Pike

Add agriculture to everything else that is being destroyed – the love of money is the root or all evil. Man does not live by bread alone.

While I don’t think that lettuce comprises a particularly large fraction of the total nutritive intake of the human population, the other four concerns mentioned here are more than reason enough to worry. I’ve been hearing from many quarters lately that the inflation in commodities is set to spike sometime between January and March of ’11. Yes, this is a wolf. And it’s about to blow our house down.

The biggest threat to humanity is Monsanto’s terminator seed technology. A seed is planted once, grows and dies and is sterile. Farmers can’t save seeds, the have to go back to Monsanto and beg them for more. And oh by the way the seeds cost is tripled this year, don’t like it, tough.

In my view an extremely useful ‘food for thought’ (no pun intended) article. I am linking this article in an e-mail I am sending this morning to the over 10,000 (and growing – again no pun intended) opt-in Subscribers to http://stockresearchportal.com, a research website focused on Resources and Resource Stocks.

Again, thanks so much for keeping all of us informed about these things!!! A friend of mine has told me of the millions of tons of wheat, corn, barley, and soybeans that is being shipped out of this country on huge grain ships heading for China, India and other known parts of the world, leaving the U.S. with critical grain reserves very low!!! With the current weather and famines and floods in different parts of the world, it is going to skyrocket the food prices around the globe. Prepare today and get dryed foods and clean water stored for waht’s coming.

markytom

It also doesn’t help when Congress destroys farmland – good intentions – predictable disasterous results. California’s almond groves in Central Valley are becoming a dust bowl. Hurray for the US Government!

Looks to me like one would be wise to be prepared with some emergency food on hand and encourage others to do the same. I do not believe in panic, but I do believe in preparation.

happy face

One way to end-run some of the concerns on these pages is to grow fruit trees in addition to your garden. You could almost live on figs if you had to and they are easy to preserve. Also trees last for years. I am experimenting with raising fig trees in pots. My first year I got a handful of figs off of a year-old tree in a pot. I am taking cuttings off of some of my mature trees and I am potting all I can using ten gallon pots.

Also, stockpile fertilizer. Keep it dry and out of the sun and it will last for years.

Joni

Good point, Jonas. I think YouTube has part of the video available.

sharonsj

Funny, the second I read “soy blight” I thought of GMOs and Monsanto as the culprit. This country (and the rest of the world) has been sold to the highest bidder or the company that gives the most to our elected representatives.

Even before reading this I was stocking up on certain staples (coffee, sugart, liquor) not only for future use but for barter. Looks like I’ll need to find a way to preserve flour as well.

I’ve had to give up eating seafood. I won’t eat farm raised and I can’t tell what might have come from the Gulf. So much of what we eat isn’t labeled, that we need to grow our own. I can’t grow fish, but even I can grow veggies in a pot.

Sailor Jo

The Germans are very restrictive when it comes to genetically modified food. Still, the international food mafia slips modified seeds into the supply chain and does damage. Modified corn is not legal in Germany to be used for human consumption but it can be used as feed. Guess what happens?

I believe we should stop this madness and focus more on the “old style” farming with having smaller fields, rotate crops, and have several different crops in a small place as insulation from diseases.

NadePaulKuciGravMcKi

Take a look at your gas pump to see how
much corn you are putting in your tank.

Flour will go rancid after a short while. It is better to store whole grains(wheat, corn,etc..) and grind them as needed. They will keep for a very long time

GoneWithTheWind

Weak arguement at best. The author failed to connect the dots between weeds and GMO or “playing god”. I challenge anyone to show me where “tens of thousands of acres of U.S. farmland have actually been abandoned”.

David

Pigweed, if this variety is the normal species known as Lamb’s Quarters, is a weed that is more nutricious and delicious than most of the greens
planted in the soil the pigweed is removed from.
It is the first plant that grows in the Spring in disturbed soil. Interesting. that and dandelions.
When picked at 6 – 10″ high,lightly steamed and served with butter and a little salt and pepper….., there is nothing better. This GMO
problem could be a boon if the pigweed is not GMO or a Round-up casualty.

D Pessimist

“a world that already does not grow enough food for everyone (thanks to the greed of the elite)”

Now why throw that load of tripe into an otherwise good article? We can’t grow enough food for everyone because THERE ARE TOO MANY PEOPLE. Every single significant problem the world faces today can be distilled to overpopulation. The reason we can’t feed everyone is because every species faces starvation when it overpopulates.

Humanity’s problem is Nature’s solution.

bmwsid

There are too many people who cant or won’t grow something! Too few farmers!!

Matt R

@D Pessimist: You are entirely correct. Overpopulation among people that can barely feed themselves, much less their spawn, is the real problem. I feel horrible for the kids but why do these third-worlders keep breeding?

tracy

actually, most places that don’t have enough food are starving because of war and corruption. ethiopia used to be a bread basket of the world. war kills more people by starvation than famine or “overpopulation” ever has.

WhiskeyJim

Luckily we’re not burning up 7 gallons of oil to produce 8 gallons of corn based ethanol that burns out motors and does not slow down ‘global warming’ one iota.

Although it does drive up the price of corn and therefore make it more difficult for the poor to eat.

Time to load the truck with silver and gold and any other tangible asset.
I saw an editorial about Monsanto, these guys control farming.

MunchyCrunchy

Does this mean that American obesity will soon be a thing of the past? Woohoo – time to sell your McFastFood stock?

equilibrium

as with anything else a balance is needed,and the world is two billion people in exess the more we grow the fast it comes(famine)so simple…let`s start a only hand guns war ,, or start some org. to protect bugs if it accomplish with plages as well as with human beens every thing will be allright

KeepYourrRosariesOffMyOvaries

The lack of basic humanity and compassion of some of these comments are appalling. When you are on the end of someone with power hoping your children (spawn) die of stavation, I hope you remember what you said of others. Perhpas you think that people who can’t afford food can somehow afford to buy birth control or do you think you can convince all the males to become celibate??

This kind of nastiness fortunately is not overwhelming on this site or it would force me not to want to having anything to do with it.

I’m not here to read racist crap like this but to get common sense analysis of this news and practical ways to protect myself and loved ones.

I’ve got 40 acres in a remote mountainous area of the U.S. and am getting seeds and equipment together as well as I can as well as buying silver. Gold is too expensive and not pratical in my opinion for everyday commerce.

Before the Govt. lets everything get out of control they will slap martial law, food, work and price controls on everybody. The underground free market may be the only place to get necessary medicines and services. Barter will be necessary at first because you can’t eat gold or silver, but after things settle down a bit there will be a need for “real” store of value money.

Would like to buy some more Krugerrands, just because I do like the feeling of a genuine goldcoin. Even though its only 21 carat of gold.

RICK

YOU ARE SO RIGHT IT SHOWS HOW BAD OUR SOCIETY HAS BECOME WITH ALL THERE MATERIALIST THOUGHTS,OVER THE BEAUTIFUL EXPIERIANCE OF BRINGING A NEW LIFE INTO THE WORLD,WE AS PEOPLE HAVE TO BECOME MORE HUMAN AND PUT OUR SELVES IN THE OTHER HUMANS SHOES BEFORE WE CAN PASS ANY JUDGEMENT ON ANYONE,I ONLY HOPE WE CAN WAKE UP IN TIME TO STOP WHAT IS TAKING PLACE IN THE WORKD TODAY.
I HAVE ALSO STARTED OUR PROCESS TO GET PREPARED FOR WHAT IS COMMING,OUR FAMILY MAKE GEODESICK DOME SHELTER HOMES,THEY ARE INDISTRUCTABLE,WITHSTANDS 9.5 EARTQUAKE,HURRICANES UPTO 300 MILES PER HOUR,THE STRUCTUR HAS BEEN PROVEN BY ALL STRUCTURAL ENGINEERS AS SUPERIOR TO ALL OTHER STRUCTURES,WE HAVE LAND ,I WILL NOT MENTION WHERE BECAUSE OF WHO IS INVOLVED IN WHAT IS GOING ON IN THE WORLD AND WE ARE STARTING OUR ORGANIC FARMS FOR FOOD SOURCEMAND OTHER ALTERNITIVE METHODS FOR FOOD SOURCES ARE BEING ESTABLISHED,ALSO WATER SYSTEMS,AIR SYSTEMS, NATURAL SEWAGE SYSTEMS,SOLOR AND WIND POWER IMPEMENTED,AND ALSO MY OWN INVENTION IS TO CONVERT OUR PERSONAL KENETIC ENERGY TO POWER,KEEPS US IN SHAPE AND MORE TO TRY TO BE PREPAIRED FO MOST EVERYTHING,IF YOU WOULD LIKE INFO LEAVE A COMMENT HERE ON SITE